Household Charge Mega-Thread [Part 3] Poll Reset

bgrizzley wrote: »

Jaysus lads, between wine and fancy beer do ye think there's no feckin recession on? this is what im on...

http://hywelsbiglog.files.wordpress.com/2008/02/image341.jpg

looks like beer tastes like flat guinness...

Is that enda on the label of that bottle???

gerryo777 wrote: »

Is that enda on the label of that bottle???

no Carlsberg have the copyright on him :pac::pac::pac::pac::pac::pac:

gerryo777 wrote: »

Yea, your right there. The fact that we have so many pro-taxers who believe that we will slash and burn our way out of a recession is quite sad.

And this guy probably dos'ent know anything about economics either, what do you think, gerry. You know, the other side will find something derogatory to say about his views.

"You can't cut your way out of a recession. You have to grow your ...

darkhorse wrote: »

And this guy probably dos'ent know anything about economics either, what do you think, gerry. You know, the other side will find something derogatory to say about his views.

"You can't cut your way out of a recession. You have to grow your ...

The dogs on the street knows that a country can only cut so much before it becomes seriously counter productive.
Enda doesn't have a dog, although he's doing what that german dog tells him to do.

donalg1 wrote: »

They should get experts to do a report on the best way to reform Ireland's fcuked up tax system.

Oh wait look they did get a report and the commission recommended the introduction of a property tax.

Hilarious.

Ya know whats really hilarious about it, donny. Its that the commission to decide what the least well off in society is going to pay, also what heading they are going to use for said payment(I just wonder, will there ever come a time when they will run out ideas for headings in relation for the future payments that they are going to extract from us) to fund the most well off, is comprised of some of the most advantagiously remunerated people in said society. I would gladly do a report for a quarter of the salary that some of them are on. It must be really great to be an expert.

lugha

Ghandee wrote: »

You sir, have excellent taste. (you should definitely try the winter brew though )

Goddammit, can't slag that post! :pac:

I think I might have done a few weeks back. Fancy colourful label on the bottle? Not so sure if it’s for me though. I might try a few over the Xmas again but I think I won’t be deviating. When I make up my mind ….. :pac:

darkhorse wrote: »

And this guy probably dos'ent know anything about economics either, what do you think, gerry. You know, the other side will find something derogatory to say about his views.

I don’t disagree that removing money from the economy during a recession is damaging and at some point may become counter-productive. (Though the alternative, which everybody ignores, would involve piling up a massive debt, the servicing of which won’t do much for the economy either in the long term. Even with the reforms we are going to have a dirty big national debt, along with the banking one).

I am saying that a decision to desist from austerity is not one that we can make unilaterally. Perhaps the Troika may eventually change tact and agree to a slower pace of reform but unless and until they do, they are the only ones who will lend to us and we have to do so on their terms.

We can march up and down O’Connell St. all we like, it won’t do much good. And neither will any fine arguments about it not being possible to cut your way out of a recession. If we had our economic sovereignty and could raise money in the usual way, we could decide what the lesser evil was. Shrinking the economy our inflating our national debt. We don’t so we can’t.

tayto lover

Well there is no job creation at all.
No money being pumped into small businesses.
Taking money out of the economy only leads to more job losses.
More taxes and more people on the dole.
Less people working forced to pay for more people on the dole.
The middle income forced to pay for the top and the bottom.
Unsustainable.
There will be trouble ahead.

lugha wrote: »

So we all agree that austerity is not working.

At last. Yes we do all agree. The majority of people, afaik, was always of the opinion that austerity is not working.

Austerians utterly wrong – at vast human cost.

But the Austerians won't give up without a fight. They seem to have two tactics. The first is to blame the lack of growth on anything other than the cuts - be it the euro crisis, the weather, health-and-safety regulations, the family dog, etc, etc.

You dont have to even be educated to know that without growth, if you have continuing austerity, the country is on a sure path to financial destruction. Lets try growth(if its not too late, it just may be), then we can talk about austerity. This not withstanding, I still do not, and never will, agree with a property tax on my home.

Vladimir Kurtains wrote: »

I know. It smacks of a conspiracy. I mean, it's not like the independent report we commissioned on taxation said that the introduction of a property tax was one of the most urgent reforms needed in the Irish taxation system.

Except it wasn't this government that commissioned the report.

I know that we know you from boards, Vlad, but a stranger lookin in and reading the above post may well deem you to be a government apologist. It does not matter which government appointed the commission, they still answer to the government of the day.

Maggie 2 wrote: »

Of course the Pay for Nothing, Expect Everything free brigade wasting more taxpayers money with pointless posteuring.

What does this mean?

darkhorse wrote: »

What does this mean?

Who knows. I don't think even she does!

gerryo777 wrote: »

I don't know how merkel & co are putting up with us then when she sees the money our politicians get, not to mention our overpaid PS including a city librarian on over €120k, city and county managers on €160k - €180k, allowances, un-vouched expenses, ex-taoiseach on €150k pensions etc etc, that list goes on and on and on........ Oh yea, and the fact that the same PS are still getting pay rises 4 years into the worst recession this country has ever seen.

lugha wrote: »

Exactly.And that is what any potential lender will think too.

But, lugha, did'nt you say in an earlier post that any prospective lender will insist on reforms, before lending us money. So, when did the troika first come here, and did they see the books, if so, surely they must have access to the same information that we posters have in regards to data regarding the salaries of some PS/CS, Bankers, etc etc. What did they, according to the current powers that be, seek to reform, only the financial demise of the lower and middle class in this country. They are still lending, in spite of the almost lotto type salaries that are being paid out to a lot of people here. Something here stinks to high heaven.

lugha wrote: »

I am saying that a decision to desist from austerity is not one that we can make unilaterally.

Not even desist, but defer, would really make sense, as, the way I see it, it has to be in the lenders interest just as much as in our interest that our economy achieves growth once again, as, the pure fact of the matter is, if and when the economy goes down the tubes, (due to unnecessary stagnation, brought on by lack of forsight), the lender does not get paid back, so therefore, is not the lender cutting off his nose to spite his face?

Le_Dieux

darkhorse wrote: »

And this guy probably dos'ent know anything about economics either, what do you think, gerry. You know, the other side will find something derogatory to say about his views.

"You can't cut your way out of a recession. You have to grow your ...

Expect Noonan to make a bold move and try a bit of stimulus??? Best joke of the day that!:pac::pac::pac::pac::pac:

lugha

darkhorse wrote: »

But, lugha, did'nt you say in an earlier post that any prospective lender will insist on reforms, before lending us money. So, when did the troika first come here, and did they see the books, if so, surely they must have access to the same information that we posters have in regards to data regarding the salaries of some PS/CS, Bankers, etc etc. What did they, according to the current powers that be, seek to reform, only the financial demise of the lower and middle class in this country. They are still lending, in spite of the almost lotto type salaries that are being paid out to a lot of people here. Something here stinks to high heaven.

It was clear from early days that the IMF in particular were not going to be too prescriptive with their medicine. As long as we got our house in order, they weren’t over-fussed about the detail.

For example, and as the no side here keep pointing out, they do not unilaterally insist on a property tax, if something else with the same merits could be found. Though in this case, I don’t think there is a real choice. If they tell us it has to walk, talk, eat , sleep and sh*t like a duck, they are pretty much saying it has to be a duck.

And of course, they may like me, have calculated that reforming the pay of a small number at the top was only going to have a symbolic rather than meaningful impact on any reform programme.

darkhorse wrote: »

Not even desist, but defer, would really make sense, as, the way I see it, it has to be in the lenders interest just as much as in our interest that our economy achieves growth once again

Once again, it doesn’t matter what if we think it makes sense or not. We can’t yet issue bonds at any kind of an acceptable rate so we are relying on the Troika for money to keep the ship afloat and they have conditions. This is a consequence of losing our economic independence.

I’m genuinely perplexed as to why you lads have trouble seeing this. Maybe I will buy ye all a wall poster with the serenity prayer for Xmas?

And yes you are right. Our lenders will want their money back. And you can be sure that they will have insisted on the conditions they have to maximise the chances of this. Even if they are wrong about this, it is still they who call the shots.

And you keep going on about the deferring austerity as if there was no down side to it. If we don’t do anything about our massive deficit, our national debt will rise more and more and become even more economically crippling for future generations than it currently is on course to do.

It isn’t the no-brainer that you pretend it is. And even if it is was, it is not our call.

Edit: Interesting article from Dan O'Brien on austerity. He doesn't see it as clear cut as you and some of the other lads do.

Over old ground again, but while you and the IMF may think symbolic is only a waste of time, i say that its all important. Only a fool would tow the line, taking all the pain while his "master" took all the gain. For what, patriotism? the good of Europe?

Every general knows that leading his troops from the front inspires those men.
if they had started cutting (properly) at the top then those of us on the bottom may have taken the medicine better. But too late now i think.

by the way while you're serenely talking to Jesus about the Troika ask him what he thinks of usury...

bgrizzley wrote: »

Over old ground again, but while you and the IMF may think symbolic is only a waste of time, i say that its all important. Only a fool would tow the line, taking all the pain while his "master" took all the gain. For what, patriotism? the good of Europe?

Every general knows that leading his troops from the front inspires those men.
if they had started cutting (properly) at the top then those of us on the bottom may have taken the medicine better. But too late now i think.

by the way while you're serenely talking to Jesus about the Troika ask him what he thinks of usury...

Who are you including when you post on behalf of "us" at the bottom? If you have identified the top and you are at the bottom who is in the middle?

You may think it is foolish to toe the line and obey the law but for the sake of €100 I think it is foolish not to. Unless you can wrap your house in invisible clingfilm.

where did i say im posting on behalf of anyone except myself?

The middle is the new bottom.

If everyone obeyed every law blindly, you and me would be having this discussion down a mineshaft while our owners were whipping us for not working hard enough.
Luckily for you, some of your ancestors did break the law.

edit
fair enough i see where i said us..(not posting for you though, you are well able to talk for yourself;))

A post for lugha, borrowed from another thread.

It hits the nail on the head.....

"More of the usual 'There Is No Alternative' brainwashed austerity thinking; the most utterly stupid thing a country can do when faced with an economic recession, is to start paying down a deficit and hiking taxes, when that only makes the problem worse.

It is plainly obvious that our country needs public and private debt restructuring, to lessen the load of debt deflation on demand, potentially also a debt jubilee, and a job guarantee program to get people out of unemployment and working/earning again; all of this needs to be undertaken at an EU level.

You don't need a deficit to fund these things, because the EU is perfectly capable of creating money to fund them (this statement alone debunks almost the entire austerity argument), and the EU is also perfectly capable of minimizing any inflation from that as well.

You don't run a countries economy like you run a household, minimizing spending in hard times and saving in good times; that's not how things work in a fiat currency system, it is counterproductive and needlessly causes widespread harm to the economy.

It's also stupid how people dissuade the very idea of protesting: You don't need a plan for reform to protest, when you see an endless number of things that are wrong and individually worth protesting about, when you see the massive harm current policies are causing by pushing people into unemployment, how people are being pushed into poverty and how many more will be as the crisis worsens; and as it is now, it's only going to get worse, because we are still only around the first half of the crisis (and guess what we need to do to stop things getting worse? we need to fúcking protest, because the alternative policies are there, but bigger member states in the EU are preventing them from being undertaken, and we need to pressure government, to put pressure on the EU).

Ignorance is no excuse for dissuading protests, that's trying to impose your own defeatism/apathy onto other people; if you are too stupid to see or learn about alternative policies yourself, then you have no right to criticize other people for protesting, and least of all to criticize others for not having the solutions themselves.

The solutions are there, but the wider populace does not know them, because they are being fed the austerity scaremongering bullshít in media discourse, and some probably also get dissuaded from even trying to find out, when encountering people online who tell them there's no alternative, and who try to dissuade anyone from protesting unless they can spell out a full-fledged plan for recovery.

You'd swear some of these posters revel in peoples suffering ffs, and that their spouting of warrantless pessimism/negativity, is more schadenfreude than anything else."

Oh yea, @ Ghandee.
Should have said nothing last night, the clown is awake and on his way back here, I'd reckon.;)

bgrizzley wrote: »

where did i say im posting on behalf of anyone except myself?

The middle is the new bottom.

If everyone obeyed every law blindly, you and me would be having this discussion down a mineshaft while our owners were whipping us for not working hard enough.
Luckily for you, some of your ancestors did break the law.

edit
fair enough i see where i said us..(not posting for you though, you are well able to talk for yourself;))

I'm not in favour of child labour, slavery or apartheid. Their existence and subsequent abolition (mostly) have been used many times in these threads to justify not paying the HHC. But strangely enough there were also property taxes back then and they were never abolished with the advent of more enlightened thinking (except in Ireland).

The only result of breaking the HHC law is that individual homeowners will leave themselves open to prosecution, run up unnecessary arrears and have a charge attached to the title of their property. Anyone waiting for a bright new future with no property taxes can forget it.

dxhound2005 wrote: »

I'm not in favour of child labour, slavery or apartheid. Their existence and subsequent abolition (mostly) have been used many times in these threads to justify not paying the HHC. But strangely enough there were also property taxes back then and they were never abolished with the advent of more enlightened thinking (except in Ireland).

The only result of breaking the HHC law is that individual homeowners will leave themselves open to prosecution, run up unnecessary arrears and have a charge attached to the title of their property. Anyone waiting for a bright new future with no property taxes can forget it.

not to justify not paying the HHC,(its been rightly pointed out that human rights and taxes are not the same) but to justify not blindly following laws.

if we were all to follow your lead, all a future government would have to do to enslave us to poverty forever is pass a law, (ie 99% income tax for everyone under 100k, ("unfair, you say? so what? its the law!!")
Your trust in political infallibilty is endearing but misguided DX.:(

bgrizzley wrote: »

not to justify not paying the HHC,(its been rightly pointed out that human rights and taxes are not the same) but to justify not blindly following laws.

if we were all to follow your lead, all a future government would have to do to enslave us to poverty forever is pass a law, (ie 99% income tax for everyone under 100k, ("unfair, you say? so what? its the law!!")
Your trust in political infallibilty is endearing but misguided DX.:(

And where else does your attitude to the law allow you to go? A bit of money laundering, a little shoplifting, some VAT fraud?

I believe in democracy and the rule of law and despite all the vile abuse heaped on the present administration here they are the properly elected government for the time being and entitled to legislate. They will stand or fall on their record and no government which introduced the sort of proposterous measure you mentioned would survive any length of time.

lugha wrote: »

I have a nice line in free range fresh air I could flog to them? :P

Oops, I think you just gave them an idea for their next tax heading.:eek:

gerryo777 wrote: »

A post for lugha, borrowed from another thread.

It hits the nail on the head.....

"More of the usual 'There Is No Alternative' brainwashed austerity thinking; the most utterly stupid thing a country can do when faced with an economic recession, is to start paying down a deficit and hiking taxes, when that only makes the problem worse.

It is plainly obvious that our country needs public and private debt restructuring, to lessen the load of debt deflation on demand, potentially also a debt jubilee, and a job guarantee program to get people out of unemployment and working/earning again; all of this needs to be undertaken at an EU level.

You don't need a deficit to fund these things, because the EU is perfectly capable of creating money to fund them (this statement alone debunks almost the entire austerity argument), and the EU is also perfectly capable of minimizing any inflation from that as well.

You don't run a countries economy like you run a household, minimizing spending in hard times and saving in good times; that's not how things work in a fiat currency system, it is counterproductive and needlessly causes widespread harm to the economy.

It's also stupid how people dissuade the very idea of protesting: You don't need a plan for reform to protest, when you see an endless number of things that are wrong and individually worth protesting about, when you see the massive harm current policies are causing by pushing people into unemployment, how people are being pushed into poverty and how many more will be as the crisis worsens; and as it is now, it's only going to get worse, because we are still only around the first half of the crisis (and guess what we need to do to stop things getting worse? we need to fúcking protest, because the alternative policies are there, but bigger member states in the EU are preventing them from being undertaken, and we need to pressure government, to put pressure on the EU).

Ignorance is no excuse for dissuading protests, that's trying to impose your own defeatism/apathy onto other people; if you are too stupid to see or learn about alternative policies yourself, then you have no right to criticize other people for protesting, and least of all to criticize others for not having the solutions themselves.

The solutions are there, but the wider populace does not know them, because they are being fed the austerity scaremongering bullshít in media discourse, and some probably also get dissuaded from even trying to find out, when encountering people online who tell them there's no alternative, and who try to dissuade anyone from protesting unless they can spell out a full-fledged plan for recovery.

You'd swear some of these posters revel in peoples suffering ffs, and that their spouting of warrantless pessimism/negativity, is more schadenfreude than anything else."

Doesn't hit the nail on the head for me, just another rant with the usual abuse and invective. He/she seems to think there is a lot of stupidity out there and that the wider populace does not have access to the knowledge that is in their posession. I wonder what their "job guarantee programme" would consist of, more PS employees maybe?

dxhound2005 wrote: »

And where else does your attitude to the law allow you to go? A bit of money laundering, a little shoplifting, some VAT fraud?

I believe in democracy and the rule of law and despite all the vile abuse heaped on the present administration here they are the properly elected government for the time being and entitled to legislate. They will stand or fall on their record and no government which introduced the sort of proposterous measure you mentioned would survive any length of time.

Your present administration were lawbreakers too at one time, otherwise you'd be paying your HHC with £stg...:eek:

Am Chile

Seen the media reports saying from 18.000 then to 10.000 attended yesterdays march it doesn,t surprise me one bit the establishment playing down the numbers yet again at another protest-last saturday week the march for Savita which I also attended-the establishment said only 6,000 to 7,000 attended-when most people seen the photos and video footage of last weeks march will know dam well there was far more then 7,000 at it-just like yesterday there was far more then 10,000 attended yesterdays march.

Hijpo

Am Chile wrote: »

Seen the media reports saying from 18.000 then to 10.000 attended yesterdays march it doesn,t surprise me one bit the establishment playing down the numbers yet again at another protest-last saturday week the march for Savita which I also attended-the establishment said only 6,000 to 7,000 attended-when most people seen the photos and video footage of last weeks march will know dam well there was far more then 7,000 at it-just like yesterday there was far more then 10,000 attended yesterdays march.

The march in waterford amounted to 15000 just compare the pictures from both and make your own mind up.

lugha

Am Chile wrote: »

Seen the media reports saying from 18.000 then to 10.000 attended yesterdays march it doesn,t surprise me one bit the establishment playing down the numbers yet again at another protest-last saturday week the march for Savita which I also attended-the establishment said only 6,000 to 7,000 attended-when most people seen the photos and video footage of last weeks march will know dam well there was far more then 7,000 at it-just like yesterday there was far more then 10,000 attended yesterdays march.

If people with a vested interest are likely to massage the figures as the media have apparently (don't worry, I'm not going to ask you to back that claim up!

) then shouldn't the same reasoning apply when ye lads tell us what the figures were? :pac:

So, by how much are ye over-egging the pudding?